Gardening Methods

HELP! Organic Gardening in New England. Aphid Attack!?

5 days ago I 1st noticed few winged tho sm adults and quite a few eggs on the underside of my Sugar Snap Peas & Snow Peas. I Garden Dust from company named BONIDE. An Insecticide-fungiside dust. Had a ton of rain & cold, so just got back out there today and they seem to have multiplied a tenfold! Many, many winged and more eggs! Can anyone help me before I give up on organic and just BLAST them away with chemicals which just goes against everything! Any serious advice out there? Please? Thanks, Alley

Hey Alley,

Dish soap in water, then spray the leaves where they nest and eat, be sure to get the underside. You can spray that heavily, the drippings will fertilize your plants. This is Tri-sodium-phosphate (common soap).

I notice the article below says use insect soaps, which, many gardeners will tell you it is ok to use dish soap. You can wash the critters away with a spray, and they cannot get back to the leaves also. But the soap kills them – and I never saw it harm any of the plants I use it on. Keep it light on the soap, a slight foaming in the spray bottle should do it. A Squirt, and a quart of water should do it.

Natural Pest Control